Who Was Christopher Hitchens? The Life Of The Controversial Vanity Fair Columnist
Oct. 30 2018, Updated 2:48 p.m. ET
By Debbie Emery - Breaking Celebrity News Reporter
Love him or hate him, it was impossible not to respect author and journalist Christopher Hitchens, who died Thursday at the age of 62.
As fans of his work mourned his death from pneumonia stemming from oesophageal cancer, Breaking Celebrity News reveals the man behind the famous byline who spoke out against Mother Theresa, Hilary and Bill Clinton, and even God.
Born in Portsmouth, England in 1949 to parents who were both in the Royal Navy, young Christopher was educated at a boarding school in Cambridge where he later confessed to having experimented with relationships with other male students, and even fell in love with a boy named Guy, who he exchanged poems and "white-hot snatched kisses" with.
He continued his sexual experiments at Oxford University where he had affairs with two men who went on to become prominent politicians in Margaret Thatcher's government.
Hitchens embraced the political activism of the sixties after becoming fuelled by anger over the Vietnam war, racism and oligarchy, and was arrested at many rallies and protests that he passionately took part in.
The left-wing enthusiast began writing for the New Statesmen, where he became friends with now-esteemed authors Martin Amis and Ian McEwan.
Soon after tragedy struck his family, when his mother overdosed on sleeping pills in a hotel room in Greece as part of a tragic suicide pact with her clergy-man lover.
After moving to America in 1981 and writing for liberal weekly, The Nation, Hitchens later got the job that he would be best known for as Contributing Editor at Vanity Fair magazine in 1991.
Throughout his career he became famous for his essay-style columns from around the world, including Cyprus, Chad, Uganda, and Sudan, and he was celebrated for his work with a National Magazine Award in 2007.
“There will never be another like Christopher,” Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter said in a statement,